Bayswater's second floor is devoted entirely to used books. What treasures we have discovered hidden among the pages of some of these titles! Read about all of our discoveries in our weekly blog.

Bayswater's Find of the Week on the Used Book Floor Blog

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Thursday, July 27, 2017

So...About that Note You Left in That Book...

Have you ever written notes to yourself regarding what
you think about a particular paragraph of a book, or how it pertains to your
life? If so, we have found that you are
definitely not alone. Our discoveries
this week are of people who have done just that, and boy, has it made for a fun
time here at Bayswater.

One of
our favorite finds was tucked into the 1969 book, A Loving Wife. According to the
author, this novel is about a “nice woman nearing middle age portrayed with wonderfully
civilized grace” (whatever that means) and her journey through life as a mother
and wife. On a small piece of trucking stationary
inside the cover we found a handwritten note in response to the title of the
book. The note read, “far from the title”. We wondered, did the writer of the note think
that the character of the book was far from a loving wife or could it be that the note’s author was talking about his actual wife? Truthfully, we think it was the latter and
that notion has created many possible scenarios to build upon regarding a
trucker on the open road, gleaning advice from this 1969 book for women while
writing down a few true confessions of his own.

Another
of our favorites was found in the 2015 book, Translating God: Hearing God’s Voice for Yourself and the World Around
You. Towards the beginning, the
author writes about how he was talking to the stranger next to him on a commercial
flight and the stranger stated that he worked for oil companies and traveled a
lot. The author thought that the
stranger looked distracted, however, and when the stranger got up to use the
bathroom, the author wrote that he suspected that the man “wasn’t telling him the
truth” and that the stranger actually “didn’t work for oil companies, but was
really the air marshal”. Written on a
small card and placed with an arrow pointing to this passage was the following
message:

“Don- can I get an amen?! – Phyllis”

Did
Phyllis (whoever she was) also have experience trying to root out which
passenger could have been the air marshal during her travels? Was Don her assistant in that quest? Let us all hope that Phyllis is not in the
seat next to us next time we fly the friendly skies. Move over, Columbo…Phyllis (and possibly Don)
is on the scene.

Our featured used books are always for sale here at Bayswater and The Loving Wife can be yours for the
price of $18, as it is a first edition (and yes, you can have the note, too).
Translating God, however, is
no longer available, as it just sold last week during the used book sale. To catch up with our previous finds of the
week from the used book floor, you can always check us out at
bayswaterbooks.com and on facebook, or stop by the store!